Weekday Squib: Pashmina and plagiarism

What’s some cross-border plagiarism?

On January 10th this year, the Wall Street Journal carried a report by Vibhuti Agarwal on Pakistan’s taking issue an Indian move to register a Geographical Indicator tag for Kashmiri pashmina. Doing so would accord the real pashmina with legal protection, not least against those synthetic China-made shawls that make the exotic fabric affordable for all. Now, since pashmina is produced on both sides of the Line of Control, Pakistani manufacturers would stand to lose if they can’t sell their stuff as Kashmiri pashmina. That dispute is being sorted out by a tribunal.

There’s a post about this on a new blog started by reporters at Dawn, the well-regarded Pakistani newspaper. Ironically, in a post about an IPR dispute, it has taken a few lines from the WSJ report without due attribution. Here’s the Dawn blog:

The tribunal is expected to decide on the issue some time soon. It may bring it down to a compromise that allows both India and Pakistan to use the term or the tribunal may ask India to re-file a joint application with Pakistan. If the decision ends up in India’s favour, already bitter relations could get even worse. [The Dawn blog]

And here’s the original:

The tribunal is expected to decide on the issue as soon as mid-January. It may stitch together a compromise and allow both India and Pakistan to use the term. Or it may ask India to refile a joint application with Pakistan. Or it could sour relations further by declaring a victory for India. [WSJ]

Like the pashmina, not quite the same. But not that different either.

Update: The good people at the Dawn blog have since linked to the WSJ article.